Daily Farm Photos

Battling Deer in the Garden, Make a Deer Proof Garden

We have some deer starting to help themselves in the garden, mainly our parsley companion plants, tops of tomato plants, and all my damn carrots. Honestly, this is to be expected. We like our local deer for the most part. We enjoy watching them, eating them, etc. We don’t enjoy feeding them food we’ve prepared for ourselves and for over the winter. However, we need to make a deer proof garden.

The biggest thing a gardener can do to ensure a good harvest is to plant extra. This is a good idea for the most part, because you will lose some crops every year to one thing or another. However, it’s not without its flaws. The more you plant, the more pests you could also attract, the more work you have to put into the garden, and possibly more money.

That said, we’re learning ways to help fight against pests. Right now, our focus is on white-tail deer, prominant in these parts and a large nuasance to gardeners.

So what are we doing to make a deer proof garden?

Some of the options we researched included planting herbs and things that would deter the deer. But once a garden is established, this is difficult to do. Another option was to put down some predator urine of some sort that would scare the deer, but that can get expensive and uh…smelly?

Ultimately we are resolving to make a deer proof garden with two options:

Physical Barrier

We’ve decide to create a barrier around our garden (we’re still setting it up currently). We’re using Premier1 Electric fencing with a solar battery. We’re waiting for the fencing to be delivered, but this will be our main deter against deer and smaller critters who want to munch on our garden. It will allow us to provide a movable barrier around whatever part of the garden we wish and utilize the sun to maintain that barrier.

What could be better? However, we also needed a solution in the interim until our setup is ready. That brings us to Number 2.

2. Soap

This is a tip that some little old ladies gave us at our old farm we lost back in 2008. They took old pantyhose and put in bars of Irish Spring Soap and hung them around their garden. The strong “unnatural” scent of the soap would scare the deer into thinking something isn’t right or a human is nearby and they would leave the garden alone.

So far, this appears to be working. We’re only on day 2, so I’ll know more tomorrow morning when I do my rounds. I may even leave it up even when we get the electric fencing set up, since it’s already established.